


Stuffed Rabbit

by AnonEhouse



Category: Iron Man (Movies)
Genre: Crack Treated Seriously, Fluff, Gen, Post-Iron Man 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-11
Updated: 2013-12-11
Packaged: 2018-01-04 09:39:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1079441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonEhouse/pseuds/AnonEhouse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The return of the giant pink bunny.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stuffed Rabbit

(If you are reading this on any PAY site this is a STOLEN WORK, the author has NOT Given Permission for it to be here. If you're paying to read it, you're being cheated too because you can read it on Archiveofourown for FREE.)

"They found it? Fantastic. No, don't ship it, don't clean it up, just put it in storage with the rest of the salvage. Yeah, I know it's soaked and it's gonna make a big mess. What part of 'put it in storage' do you not understand? It's SENTIMENTAL, ok? I'm coming down to get it, right now. Leave it out to drip, fine. Just WATCH IT. Don't let anyone steal it."

"Tony?" Pepper looked up from her StarkPad. They'd taken the top floor of [ the Malibu Beach Inn ](http://www.luxurylink.com/5star/hotels/malibu-california/malibu-beach-inn) while overseeing the disposition of the salvaged contents of the mansion. "What's going on?"

"The rabbit didn't die!" 

"What?" Pepper knew _she_ wasn't pregnant. Who else... well... knowing Tony... no, Tony hadn't seen anyone else since they began dating, she was prepared to wager anything on that. "So, who is it who isn't having a baby?"

Tony blinked. "Baby, what baby? I'm talking about the rabbit, Pepper! Your Christmas present! They found it!"

"Tony." Pepper stopped herself just in time. She nearly said just how much she hated that hideous, useless rabbit. She'd told him once that she didn't like it, but that was a few seconds before the house blew up and they'd both nearly died. Maybe he didn't remember. He was recovering from major surgery, and he still had panic attacks, although he tried hard to hide them from her. If that stupid rabbit made Tony happy, she would love it. "That's wonderful."

"I'm going to see what condition it's in. Do you wanna come with me?"

Oh, God, the puppydog eyes. Pepper closed the app she was enjoying and stood up. "Of course I do!"

***

Out of deference for her, Tony mostly stayed within the speed limit. Fortunately it was a fairly short journey.

"There it is! It looks pretty good," Tony said gleefully when they arrived at the storage facility.

"Uh huh." Pepper got out of the car and stared at the sodden heap of once pink plush, now dripping with seaweed and slime. "It smells," she couldn't help saying. "Really, really bad. Like week old shrimp cocktail. Tony, we can't bring this back to the hotel. They'll kick us out."

"No, no, Pepper, it's fine! I think it's fine. I just need..." Tony clambered over the rabbit, and grabbed handfuls of the fabric, tugging until the bloated mass lay on its front. It had a tail, and the tail was probably once white and fluffy. Tony tugged at the tail. He braced one foot to either side of the tail and pulled again.

"Tony." Pepper was really beginning to worry about the state of Tony's mental health. Was he trying to perform some kind of CPR on a giant rotted plush rabbit?

Abruptly Tony staggered. "It's coming!" The tail was the tag end of a zipper, Pepper now saw. "It worked... a lot... better... the first time I tried it!" he said as he walked slowly back towards the head of the rabbit, opening the zipper as he went.

Pepper was curious now. She didn't get close enough to be slimed, but she watched as Tony spread open the rabbit, ripping out handfuls of compacted fluff to reveal a shining, silvery metal rectangle around four foot square and a little over a foot deep.

"Tony?" Pepper was actually a bit excited. "The rabbit was the box?"

"Yes!" Tony pulled the silvery rectangle free of the rabbit. "Which end up... oh, yeah." Tony leaned the rectangle against the storage building and wiped clean a pink dot about the size of a quarter from the front of it. "Put your thumb there, Pepper."

"It's not going to explode or shoot lasers, is it?"

"Did you want it to?"

"No. No, I didn't." Pepper pressed her thumb to the biometric lock. The pink dot glowed green. There was a "pop" and the rectangle split down the middle and folded itself away like Tony's latest armors used to do.

"Oh. My. GOD. Tony. It's not real. It's a copy, right?" Pepper reached out to touch the frame.

"Of course it's real! I felt bad that I got rid of all the art you collected for me, so I thought we could start over. I was going to get ['The Kiss'](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Kiss_\(Klimt\)) but the more I looked at it, the creepier it looked. I mean, I couldn't even tell if she was awake."

Pepper let Tony's babbling wash over her as she gently stroked the edges of the frame of her very own Klimt. She wouldn't touch the painting itself, no, but the frame. The frame was ok, was fine. The frame was gorgeous.

"And then I thought of [ 'The Tree of Life'](http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Klimt_Tree_of_Life_1909.jpg), the lovers are still a bit creepy, but the tree is great, all that gold. Only the museum refused to dismantle the dining room wall in the Palais Stoclet to get the mural. Which, really, it's not open to the public, _anyway_ , who'd notice?"

"And then I found this [ Apple Tree](http://www.wikipaintings.org/en/gustav-klimt/apple-tree-i) in a private collection, and well... apples, apples are good? You're not allergic to paintings of apples? It's kinda small..."

In November of 2006, The Apple Tree 1 sold for $33 million. Pepper had no idea what Tony had paid, but she doubted very much whether he'd haggled. She laughed. "It's big, Tony. It's really big. I love it." She hugged him. "You didn't have to get me anything, but I do love it."

Tony grinned. "Next time you won't look a gift bunny in the whiskers."

Pepper let him be smug. She was trying to decide where to hang her very own Klimt.

**Author's Note:**

> Have had a rotten day. Nothing major, just soul-sucking aggro every time I turn around. I couldn't even work on the Avengerkink prompt I've been TRYING to do for weeks. So I read fic and once again came across someone dissing the giant toy rabbit Tony wanted to give Pepper. Hmmm...


End file.
